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About a year and a half after Walter Lübcke's murder, there is a verdict: Stephan Ernst has to go to prison for life
Photo: Swen Pförtner / dpa
The case is considered to be the first right-wing extremist motivated murder of a politician in the history of the Federal Republic - the verdict in the Walter Lübcke murder case is correspondingly significant.
Now the higher regional court in Frankfurt has ruled: Stephan Ernst, an avowed right-wing extremist, is guilty of the murder of the Kassel district president.
Ernst has to go to prison for at least 15 years.
Because the court determined the severity of the guilt, a release from prison after this time is extremely unlikely.
In addition, the court reserved Ernst's preventive detention.
Markus H., accused of complicity in the murder of Lübcke, was acquitted.
The court only imposed a suspended sentence of one year and six months on him for violating the gun law.
The reactions are mixed
The reactions to the decision vary.
CDU leader
Armin Laschet,
party colleague of the murdered Lübcke, called on people to decisively counter hatred and agitation in everyday life.
"Because the bad word is followed by a criminal act - that is one of the terrible lessons from the murder of our friend Walter Lübcke," Laschet wrote in a post published on the CDU website.
"We are all responsible to work for peaceful cohesion - each and everyone in their own place."
"A clear sign that right-wing hatred and right-wing violence have no place in our country."
Lars Klingbeil, SPD General Secretary
SPD General Secretary
Lars Klingbeil
was relieved.
"The maximum sentence for this cowardly murder of Walter Lübcke is correct and sends a clear signal that right-wing hatred and right-wing violence have no place in our country," he told SPIEGEL.
SPD parliamentary group
deputy Dirk Wiese
said he hoped that the judgment would have a "signal effect".
Wiese demanded “that the law passed to combat right-wing extremism and hate crime should finally come”.
The Hessian FDP, meanwhile, demanded further intensive observation of co-defendant Markus H. "It must no longer happen that such threats are mistakenly out of sight of the police or the protection of the constitution," said the domestic political spokesman for the FDP parliamentary group,
Stefan Müller
.
The verdict against Ernst was a "clear sign against racism and right-wing extremism," said the President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany,
Josef Schuster
.
It is an "appropriate response to this terrible act."
At the same time, the process disclosed failures to the security authorities.
He hoped that the investigative committee in the Hessian state parliament would gain knowledge "that will make it possible to better illuminate right-wing networks in the future," said Schuster.
"The political reappraisal must go on," demanded the Federal Government's Victims Commissioner,
Edgar Franke
.
The "murder driven by hatred and inhumanity" remains a warning.
"At least since the NSU murders we shouldn't have closed our eyes"
Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker
Cologne's Lord Mayor
Henriette Reker
,
who herself was the victim of a right-wing extremist attack in 2015, made a
similar
statement
.
She survived with serious injuries.
You very much welcome that the court has recognized murder and not manslaughter, Reker said now.
“Because it was murder.
It was a cowardly murder of a family man, a husband and a politician. "
The process has now been concluded, but the dispute with right-wing extremism should not be over.
"At least since the NSU murders, we shouldn't have turned a blind eye to political murders from the right corner," said Reker.
In contrast,
Martina Renner,
deputy party leader of the Left, described the judgment against Stephan Ernst and Markus H.
as inadequate
.
It remains "behind expectations in decisive points," said Renner.
You share the position of Lübcke's relatives, who assumed that H. was significantly involved in the planning and execution of the murder.
"That H. now gets away with a suspended sentence is disappointing."
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